Media accounts of numbers vary widely, but that's . . . . hmmm.When this picture was taken, from the railroad viaduct next to 3rd St., the back end of the crowd still hadn't turned the corner from 7th St. four blocks back. Maybe I'm too generous, but it's enough to make me wonder whether she genuinely flubbed it.

Well, to be fair, Mark the Sign Guy said that channels 2, 4 and 7 all mentioned IGOLD on the evening of the event, and Cisco Cotto of WLS AM 890 broadcast his morning show live from the Prairie Capital Convention Center! That's pretty good coverage.

Locally, I was interviewed live by WCIA CBS 3 out of Champaign, and I ran into Gordon Graham from WAND NBC 17 from Decatur as he was doing "man on the street" reaction interviews with everyone who walked by at the end of the parade. Gordon seems like a good guy, though I don't really know him. I saw a correspondent I don't know from WICS ABC 20, a local Springfield station.

We've been talking about the emphasis on FOID information in the Chicago media at www.illinoiscarry.com, and "Molly B." pointed out that if your audience is Chicago gun owners, the FOID database release is a much bigger issue for them than it would be downstate. Too many of them are afraid for their jobs or reputations if people find out that they own guns. I don't like that, but I can't disagree.